Mobile Devices - Page 124

Today Google has formally unveiled the Nexus 6P, confirming speculations and leaks with the new Android 6.0 handset. The Nexus 6P has a number of new improvements with Android 6.0 Marshmallow, but one of the most alluring announcements was the 6P can run on Google's celebrated Project Fi network.

Nexus 6P has a 5.7-inch QHD display with the screen itself taking up 74% of the actual front of the phone, making it scale much like a 5.5-inch smartphone. It sports a 64-bit processor with a full-body aluminum frame, and a built-in fingerprint sensor that instantly wakes up the phone with a single press. With Google Imprint, the software suite that runs the fingerprint sensor, users can easily pay and purchase items with the press of a button.

The Nexus 6P sports USB Type C support for rapid battery charging, and Google boasts that phone can be fully charged in half the time of an iPhone 6 Plus. To combat Apple's always-on Siri, the Nexus 6P will have always-on OK Google support for hands-free searching and interaction. Supposedly the 6P will have less bloatware, and the new doze mode puts phone in a deep sleep state to reserve power and cut out background tasks.

Apple managed to move more than 13 million iPhone 6S handsets over the launch weekend, smashing previous sales records in the process. Coupled with the projected profit of about $500 for every 64GB iPhone 6S that's sold, it's no wonder how Apple retains its status as a leading tech giant.

According from data gleaned from Teardown.com, Apple only spends an estimated $245 to make the A1688 64 GB iPhone 6s model. When we compare the $749 Apple charges for a new iPhone 6S to how much it spends, a bit of simple math shows the company makes roughly $504 in per-sale profits.

The new iPhone costs just $17 more to make than the previous iPhone 6 model, largely due to extra additions like the capacitive 3D Touch sensor and touch controller IC which accounts for about 17% or $42.50 of the total costs. The iPhone 6S' upgrade to 2GB LPDDR4 also bumped memory costs up to $16, which is a jump from the iPhone 6's 1GB LPDDR3 that costs just $4.50. The new 12MP iSight camera and accompanying front-facing 5MP camera clock in at $16.

BlackBerry has just announced the Priv, its first Android phone that features a slide-out keyboard and a curved display, and company CEO John Chen shows that Android might still be a strange new world for BlackBerry.

Chen seemed to have been caught totally off-guard during an hands-on demonstration of the Priv handheld, saying things like "obviously it runs Google" and fumbling with the OS as if it were completely alien technology. After firing up Google Chrome, Chen faltered after realizing he wasn't signed in, and after a few failed attempts he finally closed the app. Aftwards the BlackBerry CEO was content just focusing on the hardware--the 5.5-inch screen and the signature slideable BlackBerry keyboard.

The whole ordeal is kind of painful to watch and shows that Chen wasn't really prepared for the demonstration. During one segment, Chen actually verbally explains how the keyboard features capacitive touch so it can be used as a mouse for web surfing or checking text messages rather than walking through the functions on the phone. That's not to say that spontaneous demos can't be pressure-inducing affairs, but the CEO should still be able to confidently maneuver the OS and have a working knowledge of the device he's marketing.

Apple today announces that its new iPhone 6S and 6S Plus models have sold 13 million units within the first three-day period, breaking last year's 10 million sales of the iPhone 6 in the same period.

TechCrunch notes that the sales equate to roughly 3,000 iPhones sold every minute, and 50 iPhones sold every second. It's worth noting that this time around Apple opened up pre-orders for a full two weeks before launch, and also included China, a region that accounts for a vast number of iPhone users.

"Sales for iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus have been phenomenal, blowing past any previous first weekend sales results in Apple's history," Apple's CEO Tim Cook said in the official press release. "Customers' feedback is incredible and they are loving 3D Touch and Live Photos, and we can't wait to bring iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus to customers in even more countries on October 9."

Apple revealed its new iPhones a couple of weeks ago, with the new iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus featuring 13-megapixel rear-facing cameras that are 4K-capable. This is a big jump from the 8-megapixel shooters on their predecessors, that were only capable of 1080p video capture.

But media outlets like CNET are saying that the new iPhones will usher in the start of 4K, making it mainstream. This is because tens of millions of customers will buy the new iPhone, and will make 4K go "mainstream" as right now, we have a "scarcity of content", which is true. CNET adds that you "don't have much reason to pay more for a 4K television, laptop or computer monitor when there isn't much stuff to watch that way", which is again, very true.

But the likes of Samsung and Sony have have smartphones with 4K-capable cameras for years now, with Beachfront Media CEO Frank Sinton adding that "4K cameras on popular smartphones like the iPhone will create a huge amount of content". He also said that "It's definitely going to be pushing Hollywood toward doing more".

With today's release of the iPhone 6S, iFixit has just completed their thorough analysis of the phone's innards, completely exposing what makes the handheld tick. Their findings confirm and assess the entirety of the iPhone 6S' touted features and reveal some key changes in the new model, including a smaller capacity battery, a heavier display, and a new, bigger SoC with the A9 chip.

One of the first obvious changes in the iPhone 6S teardown was the smaller battery, which is now 1715 mAh compared to the beefier 1810 mAh that powers last year's iPhone 6. Even with this reduction Apple has affirmed the battery life will remain the same. It appears the battery size was cut down a bit to make room for the phone's Tactic Engine, which is fastened below the battery.

In order to maintain the new pressure-sensitive 3D Touch capability, the iPhone 6S has received a boost in capacitive sensors making the display weigh in at 60 grams total. That's 15 grams over the iPhone 6's display, and the same weight as the iPhone 6 Plus' 5.5" display. Other changes in the new Retina HD display include a slight reduction in cables and LCD plate design, but all in all the 3D Touch display seems "pretty visually similar" to past displays.

Qualcomm has just announced its next-gen Quick Charge 3.0 technology, which will charge compatible smartphones from 0% to 80% in just 35 minutes. The new Quick Charge 3.0 tech will debut on the Snapdragon 820 processor, which will arrive next year.

But it's not just the Snapdragon 820 that will receive Quick Charge 3.0, with the Snapdragon 620, 618, 617 and 430 platforms, too. If you don't know about Qualcomm's Quick Charge technology, it's the same micro USB connector that Android smartphones feature, but there's more communication between the processor and charger, so that it can safely and efficiently increase the charge rate.

The idea of going from 0% to 80% in 35 minutes is simply insane, so expect to fully charge your smartphone in under an hour in 2016 on Quick Charge 3.0 compatible smartphones.

Now that Apple is finished with its media event to unveil the new iPhone 6S, iPhone 6S Plus and the iPad Pro, it's now Microsoft's turn to blow the iPad Pro out of the water.

The Redmond-based giant has started sending out media invites for a new event in New York City on October 6, where it will be unveiling new devices running Windows 10. It hasn't said which devices it will be unveiling, but one of those will definitely be the new Surface Pro 4. The Surface Pro 4 will be powered by an Intel processor from the new Skylake family, as well as Windows 10.

Not only can we expect the Skylake-powered Surface Pro 4, but we should see the company two Lumia smartphones codenamed Cityman and Talkman. These two handsets are said to be premium flagship smartphones with QHD displays, a 6-core and 8-core processor model, 3GB of RAM and more. We could also expect Microsoft to unveil a new wearable, apart from its HoloLens headset.

Now that the new iPhone 6S, iPhone 6S Plus and iPad Pro have all been unveiled, we're hearing more details about the RAM that they will all come with. Because you know, Apple doesn't like to give out the details on the RAM inside of its smartphones and tablets at whim.

The new iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus will both feature 2GB of RAM, while the 12.9-inch iPad Pro will include 4GB of RAM. The news is coming from the Twitter account of iOS developer Hamza Sood, where he said: "Not much of a surprise but Xcode confirms 2GB of RAM for the 6s (and 6s plus), and 4GB for the iPad Pro".

With the iPad Pro being able to edit three 4K video streams at once, it would really need to have 4GB of RAM, which Apple seems to have crammed into the 12.9-inch slate. When it comes to the new iPhones, they have 2GB of RAM versus the 1GB of RAM in the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. But, the new iPhones reportedly have two dual-core processors at different clock speeds, which will provide some much needed performance.

Riding on the marketing train of the new iPhones that Apple unveiled earlier this week in the iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus, we're beginning to hear more rumors on Samsung's latest Galaxy smartphone, the Galaxy S7.

Samsung's Galaxy S7 will reportedly feature a 5.7-inch display, and will be using Qualcomm's Snapdragon 820 processor - seeing Samsung move away from using its own Exynos processor, something it did in the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 edge. The Galaxy S7 will also include an upgraded camera, with rumors pointing to it featuring an insane 27-megapixel camera or so. Comparing this to the 16-megapixel shooter on the current Galaxy handsets, and 12-megapixel shooter inside of the new iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus.

Qualcomm and reportedly been working closely with Samsung on the new Galaxy S7, so we could see Samsung's next flagship smartphone being quite the powerhouse, inside and out.

NVIDIA has been quick off the mark to trash talk the new Apple TV, which Apple says their latest TV device has gaming as a central part of their ecosystem. Well, NVIDIA is much stronger as a gaming-orientated company, so they've chimed in with their Shield TV, which is a 4K-capable device that does more than just 4K streaming or gaming.

NVIDIA created a post on the official Shield page, where it asked the question: "NVIDIA SHIELD or the New Apple TV?". NVIDIA has supported set-top gaming with Shield, which features 4K streaming, voice search, voice commands, and a massive gaming ecosystem that doesn't just include Android games, but PC games too.

And NVIDIA has a point; where the new Apple TV can play iOS games, it can't play anything outside of Apple's ecosystem. Where NVIDIA lets you live within the Android ecosystem, but it has the doors open to the PC too which expands Shield into hundreds of thousands, if not millions of games playable on its Shield TV device.

Leaked slides show that Dell will release its own 2-in-1 tablet called the XPS 12 while simultaneously pushing Microsoft's Surface Pro 3 into the enterprise sector.

The XPS 12 is very much like the Surface Pro 3 in terms of form and functionality, but Dell's new convertible tablet is has a decidedly beefier 12-inch 3840x2160 4K infinity edge-to-edge touch display that supports Dell's Active Stylus. The XPS 12 sports a 10-hour battery, a Thunderbolt 3 port, a back-facing 8MP camera complemented by a 5MP front-facing camera, and the tablet runs Windows 10.

Dell's 4K tablet also comes with a magnetic keyboard dock that features illuminated keys for extra accenting and precision typing. The leaks haven't revealed any further specifications on the XPS 12 like processing power, RAM or memory.

Android Pay, an Apple Pay rival, has now been pushed live to over one million US locations. Utilizing NFC technology in order to transfer funds from your account to a merchant, Android Pay can be used by any NFC-ready device running KitKat 4.4 or higher.

Estimated by IDC to be worth $1 trillion by 2017, analysts believe that mobile payments are the payment option of the future. With companies such as GameStop, Macy's and Staples picking up this form of payment, we may very well see this become mainstream in the near future.

Google has further confirmed that Android Pay will be rolled out to more locations in coming days, with updates following in the near future. Supporting credit and debit cards such as American Express, MasterCard, Visa and more, Apple and Android pay is all about ease of use and accessibility.

NVIDIA has been putting more resources into its Shield line as time goes by, with news of the Shield Tablet 2 now manifesting in the distance. The successor to the Shield Tablet will be powered by the company's Tegra X1 processor.

The new Shield Tablet 2 will feature an 8-inch 1920x1200 display, with the Tegra X1 packing two quad-core processors for an 8-core tablet clocked at 2.2GHz. This is the same processor that powered the original Shield Tablet, which had the issues of overheating problems recently. The new NVIDIA Shield Tablet 2 would however run Android 5.1 Lollipop, offer around 10 hours of video playback and web browsing.

Just like its predecessor, the Shield Tablet 2 will offer 4K display output, where you can output to your 4K-capable display or TV and game at 3840x2160 from a tablet. We will have dual 5-megapixel rear-facing cameras, and two front-facing speakers. The rumors suggest Shield Tablet 2 will have a micro USB port, microSD slot, and mini-HDMI ports.

Earlier today Apple confirmed the rumors that the new iPhone models would get an always-on Siri mode.

Apple's new iPhone 6S and 6S Plus will enable instant unrestricted access to the helpful AI assistant at a moment's notice. Previously Siri's wealth of knowledge and quirky persona was only usable when charging an iPhone as the AI was an enormous drain on power.

Now Apple has completely changed how we intreact with Siri. Gone are the days of pressing the home button to search the web for a particular recipe or find a flight. On the new phones, Siri is based on voice recognition and instantly responds to her namesake catchphrase "hey Siri", affording some serious potential for a million different hands-free applications. It might seem like a small change but an always-on hands-free Siri experience will undoubtedly change how many people use their phones--and what they use them for.

Apple's new flagship smartphone duo, the iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus, will release later this month with a host of new upgrades like shooting 4K video, new 3D Touch technology, beefier processing power and a new responsive Touch ID sensor.

Today Apple showcased the new iPhone 6S and 6S Plus variants and even went so far as jab competitors by saying the new models are the "most advanced smartphones in the world".

Both models can shoot and edit 4K video with 12MP iSight cameras as well as enable Live Photos, a new kind of active photography that animates shutter-speed photos into small gif-like animations. Sadly the models don't have 4K displays: the iPhone 6S has a 4.7" Retina HD display at 1334x750 resolution, whereas the iPhone 6S Plus packs a 5.5" inch 1920x1080 full HD resolution.

Apple's new iPhone 6S duo features a new evolution of multi-touch called 3D Touch technology.

Apple has changed the smartphone game with a new kind of display called 3D Touch. 3D Touch is made possible by pressure-sensitive haptic feedback, which responds to how hard you press on the phone. The harder you press the screen determines what actions are taken, and essentially the apps can pop-up and layer over one another.

Rather than working in and out and going back and forth between app screens, Apple's 3D Touch is all about going over and under. Pressing lightly on the screen lets you "peek" at content like email, and press hard to open the app itself. Users can also tether their favorite apps in an overlay for instant access, or get to the home screen by applying light pressure on the side of the screen. You can also zoom in and out with the single press of a finger.

Apple's newly announced iPad Pro is touted to deliver "PC-grade performance" with "console-like graphics".

Today Apple unveiled their new performance-driven iPad tablet, the iPad Pro. The tablet is powered by the new 3rd generation A9X processor chip that's 1.8x faster than A8X CPU, and iOS 9 brings multi-tasking capabilities to the tablet. Many of the apps on the device are run in full 60 frames-per-second. No performance specs like processor speeds were revealed but the company maintains that the tablet seamlessly blends performance and entertainment.

The iPad Pro's 12.9-inch retina display is the biggest Apple has ever made--half of its width is as tall as the iPad Air's height--and is meant to be used with two hands. The display has a resolution of with a variable refresh rate with 5.6 million more pixels than the MacBook Pro display. For the iPad Pro's audio, Apple takes a hint from ASUS's new Predator tablet and adds a quad-speaker 4 speaker audio system, which balances if you flip up upright or the side.

6S Marketing may like iPhones and other Apple products, but hopes the new iPhone isn't dubbed the iPhone 6s. The company rented billboard space in Times Square, along with plastering trucks with a plea to Apple.

You see, the company, which has offices in New York City, Toronto and Vancouver, doesn't want Apple to name its next-generation smartphone as the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus. The new phone, which is expected to be unveiled later this month, could break 6S Marketing's hearts:

"See, our company name is 6S Marketing, but our clients, friends, and colleagues simply refer to us as good ol' "6S." It's a small name but a big part of our identity -- one we've been using since 2000, when we started this company in my tiny apartment. At that time, we didn't think that one of the biggest, and most well-respected, companies would use it to name a mobile device. (We were still using Motorola flip phones at the time, after all.)

Sony has unveiled three new smartphones at IFA 2015, with the Xperia Z5 and Xperia Z5 Compact not standing out too much, but the new Xperia Z5 Premium is the world's first 4K smartphone.

Starting with the Xperia Z5, which features Sony's new 1/2.3 Exmor RS sensor crammed into a huge 23-megapixel camera with an F2.0 G Lens. This is Sony's "first completely re-imagined smartphone camera module since Xperia Z1" and has been "designed with Sony's interchangeable lens camera Alpha technology for clear, vivid imagery every time".

The new Xperia Z5 and Xperia Z5 Compact are both powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processor, which is an 8-core GPU with 4G LTE speeds and the latest in Wi-Fi technology. Both handsets pack Sony's incredible battery stamina and power-saving technologies, as well as Quick Charge 2.0 which will have your Xperia Z5 charged up in no time.